Practice Management
“Do as little as necessary, not as much as possible.” This is the mantra I recite throughout every urgent care shift without fail—that’s how mantras work after all. Hearing the word “mantra” might conjure images of a placid-faced yogi seated in the lotus position for some, but a mantra needn’t serve only spiritual practice. A well-conceived mantra can also prove useful when deployed in any context where we might benefit from being reminded frequently to …
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One Medical is under fire for failing to prioritize some patients who had symptoms that should have received immediate attention. The crux of the problem is that the virtual and in-person primary care provider—now owned by Amazon as a result of a $3.9 billion deal from February 2023—routes patients to a call center that is staffed in part by contractors with limited training, according to the Washington Post. The news outlet cites leaked documents that …
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New analysis from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) indicates that nearly 18 million US adults have experienced long COVID. Data gathered through the agency’s Medical Expenditure Panel Survey of more than 17,400 adults found 8,275 had a history of COVID-19, and 1,202 reported long-COVID symptoms. Women (8.6%) were more likely than men (5.1%) to report long COVID, and adults aged 35 to 64 were more affected than other age groups. White and …
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For most physicians, medicine is a calling, but for Roger Hicks, MD, FCUCM, and his daughter Marya Hicks, MD, medicine is also a team effort. As it turns out, both Roger and Marya care for patients at the same urgent care center. Patients arriving at the Dignity Health Medical Group Urgent Care of Sierra Nevada in Grass Valley, California, might not realize their care is delivered by a father-daughter duo. In a recent live interview …
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During the 2022-2023 season, pediatric hospitalizations for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) doubled compared to the previous year. This information comes from a study in JAMA Network Open involving 700,000 children, examining RSV-related hospitalizations and intensive care unit (ICU) admissions from July 1, 2017, to March 31, 2023. The hospitalization rate was 289.1 per 100,000 children in 2021-2022, which is consistent with the rates from 2017 to 2020. However in the following year, the 2022-2023 season …
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CityMD, which operates more than 175 urgent care centers in New York and New Jersey, has agreed to pay $12 million to settle allegations of violating the False Claims Act. The allegations state that for 2 years, CityMD knowingly submitted false claims to a federal health program for uninsured patients for COVID-19 testing. The Justice Department says CityMD failed to adequately verify patients’ insurance status, submitting claims for those who already had insurance. Additionally, CityMD …
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Two new, highly contagious fungal infections that cause rashes have been identified in the United States by New York University Langone Health researchers, according to Becker’s. The fungi species Trichophyton mentagrophytes type VII have produced severe skin infections, typically in men who have male sexual partners. Infections are challenging to treat, according to the news item, but they have been responding to treatment with terbinafine. A separate study also found that Trichophyton indotineae infections tend …
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Urgent care operators who rely on search engine optimization (SEO)—in other words, the art of building a website that Google will punch up to the top of search results for prospective patients—essentially have to guess at what digital tactics will get them into the top spot on Google. For the most part, Google’s algorithms have always been a closely guarded secret. Recently, media outlets like Inc. reported that some proprietary Google search algorithms were leaked. …
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Between 2008 and 2022, the per capita rate of cannabis use increased by 120%, according to research published in Addiction. And now for the first time, the number of Americans who use cannabis almost every day has surpassed the number who drink every day. In 2022, an estimated 17.7 million people reported using cannabis daily or near-daily. By comparison, the median drinker reported drinking alcoholic beverages on 4 to 5 days in the past month …
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Data suggests that many people who use GLP-1 drugs semaglutide and liraglutide to treat obesity and diabetes are not staying on their weight-loss plans as long as what is recommended, according to an issue brief from Blue Health Intelligence. Typically, 12 weeks is the accepted guideline for achieving meaningful weight loss. Yet, an analysis of claims from 170,000 plan members found that about 58% of people using GLP-1 medications were on their treatment plan for …
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